Dark Forces
by TheNextGreatAdventure
Summary: "It's common knowledge that in the land of Alagaesia, all children dream of becoming Riders..." Leona Freitag has been small her whole life, but four years after the Riders War, she finally has a chance to be taken into account when she becomes one of the select Riders. Fighting evils, challenges, as well as her own insecurities, Leona must rise up against the Dark Forces.
1. Chapter 1

In the land of Alagaesia it was common knowledge that almost all the children dreamt of becoming Riders. The dragons they rode having gem-like scales and mighty wings that sounded of peals of thunder. The select few who_ didn't _want to be Riders...well, they were few.

Being picked to be a possible Rider required strength and other traits like that. The problem with that was that Leona was a girl who didn't have strength or stature or any traits like that. Leona was small and petite, even for her age and gender. But Leona was also determined, and she wasn't going to let any comment about her size stop her from fulfilling her dreams. Even if it meant she had to grab on to the eminent Firnen's tail while he flew away.

And on that day in Feinster, Queen Arya of the elves was coming to send some of the people to Eragon and Saphira. When she arrived, Arya and Firnen consulted with the representative before lining up all the possible candidates for being a Rider, old and young, big and...Leona. The whole process took an excruciatingly long time and the children started shifting around and kicking loose pebbles.

That's when the Queen got to Leona. Feeling like her face was as hot as dragons fire, Leona brushed one of her cool hands against her cheek, trying to pass it off as pushing a strand of her long hair behind her ear. Seeing Arya's green eyes was startling up close and Leona sucked in a breath of air in her nervous daze. _You're rather small...do you think you'd even be able to get upon a dragon? _Firnen asked. Surprisingly, Leona didn't notice his presence in her state.

Leona was so offended that she didn't even remember to be scared. "I can do anything anyone else can do."

To Leona's dismay, Arya looked amused. _Well now I've gone and made a fool of myself. _Then Arya's face grew serious and with her mind she asked permission to look through her thoughts and memories. Leona nodded slightly and immediately a flash of memories rose before her eyes.

_A small young blond girl about twelve years old, sitting on the dusty ground behind her home examining a strange rock. A group of older kids came in front of her. _Since Leona couldn't remember what they said, their words were garbled so you couldn't understand them. _Leona put her fists to her hips, but when they wouldn't back off she ran to the tree at her back and climbed up. The kids followed her but none dared to go as high as she. _Many more memories darted in and out of Leona's subconscious and soon Arya left her mind to herself.

Nodding slightly to herself Arya told Leona to go stand near the same tree from her memories. Leona was the first Rider to be picked.


	2. Chapter 2

** _IMPORTANT! PLEASE READ:_ To continue this story I need people to go on my profile and take the poll about what color Leona's dragon will be, otherwise I would never get to really introduce Leona's dragon...as always, please review, follow, and favorite!**

Leona and the one other child that got selected, Eleanor, tried to see but the wind crashing onto their faces forced their eyes closed. Leona looked down and felt a tremor of fear. The height up here on Firnen was frightening. Before they had left the ground, Leona and Eleanor didn't try to make conversation, but instead stared at each other, they were too nervous to do anything else. After two days of bitter cold and rumbling stomachs, they finally were only an hours distance away from their destination.

"This," Arya's voice drew their attention. "Is where I leave you. Go straight and turn left at the boulder." She turned to go, but Eleanor spoke before she could leave.

"Wait, you're going to just leave us here? But... we don't have any training! We could be killed!"

Arya just raised an eyebrow at the girl and said, "I know." After that Firnen took off and soon was out of sight. Sighing, Leona started shuffling her feet in the direction she was instructed. Eleanor just sat down with a huff on the nearest rock. _Who needs her anyway?_ _I surely don't._ Leona thought with a slight scoff. The sun was just at the midafternoon point and was shining directly into her eyes, so Leona had to lift her hand up to her face so that she could look ahead and see the ground in front of her. Shaking her head Leona began the journey.

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><p>Leona's limbs were heavy and lead filled by the time she reached the boulder Arya spoke of. She turned left and looked around. What she saw was...nothing. Scanning the area, and lifting the occasional leaf to check beneath it, Leona could find nothing to help her find Eragon and Saphira. Her mind, half dead from exhaustion, was screaming and giving her a splitting headache. Without thinking it through, Leona spoke. "Hello? I'm Leona and I was sent here to see if I could become a Rider...?"<p>

With a sound like metal scraping against metal, the boulder behind spilt down the half and dragged open with just enough space for her to squeeze through. Leona took a cautionary step toward the big rock and hesitantly slipped in between it.

There were trees high above her head, which was strange considering that they only had about four years to grow, and as she absorbed her surroundings everything was shaded in green from the forest up above her. _THUMP. THUMP._ Leona's hair suddenly flew across her face from an unexpected burst of wind. Looking up, Leona saw an agile orange dragon. A short stubby man hopped down from the beast. Leona had to assume that the man was a dwarf because she hadn't actually seen one before, only heard the stories.

"Well?" The dwarf asked. "Are you coming or not? Ohen has given you permission to ride." he paused. "Wasn't there supposed to be two of you?"

Leona ran her hands through her hair, a nervous habit of hers. "Uh, you see...she, um, didn't come."

Grumbling his annoyance, the small man, whose name she later learned was Gimli, waved for her to get on Ohen. Again, Leona closed her eyes for the second time that day as she feared to look down at the ground, quickly shrinking below her. After about ten minutes of flying higher and higher, the air started getting a little thin. But before Leona could mention her concerns to Gimli, they flew through two trees and a ginormous city came into sight. The air instantly became easier to breathe in. Leona now understood why the trees were so tall, because they had already been there before, and _this_ was the infamous, mysterious, slightly formidable dragon city. She looked around and became slightly dizzy from the sheer mass of the place.

Buildings were tall and wide, able to comfortably fit at least twenty dragons Ohen's size, with room to fly. The town, not yet a city, was colorful against the pale gray-blue sky. Cobblestone buildings and streets with scarlet, midnight blue, butterscotch yellow, grass-green doors. As we walked through the town I saw through the windows and discovered that the doors were the same color as the dragon that lived there. Leona was informed that all the shops were on the other side of town. Finally, the group of three reached a saphire blue door, and Leona had a feeling this was Eragon and Saphira's home.

Inside a man stood, average of height, but handsome in that intimidating way elves were. He still had round ears and ruggish features though, and Leona knew this was Eragon. Beside him lay Saphira, massive in stature and brilliant in color. She turned a knowing eye on Leona as she walked in. After Leona was finished making assessments of the pair, she looked around a saw a girl and boy human, standing as a pair. She looked over and saw another pair of human children, this time boy and boy. An attractive pair of elven children, a scary pair of Urgals, and a rather short pair of dwarves. They were all boy girl except the Urgals, they were girl girl. If anyone noticed that Leona walked in alone they didn't comment on it.

"So," Eragon smiled. "Now that we are all here, we should get started. Come, we should all have a seat." Unconsiously they all sat in a circle-like form. "We will all have to see each other as we say our names. No last names for now. You will be given a new one once you get yuor dragon egg, or acheive a daunting task. Now, lets start with...you." Eragon pointed to the human girl two people down from me, meaning that I'll announce my name second to last.

"Adara," the first girl said. The names went on and on. Leona mentioned her name and finally after they all felt a little foolish, Eragon spoke.

"Well, I suppose you're all wondering about the purpose of this lesson would be?" They nodded. "Look around. The people in this circle are going to be the people would could hold your life in their hands. You will train together, then you will fight together, after we see if a dragon picks you. I will split up the pairs and form new ones. The pairs I create will go into the Hatchling Home and search for an egg."

Leona got paired up with Kye, the boy elf. He looked slightly indignant at being paired with a _human. _There wasn't much he would be able to do though, so he had to deal with it. The pairings Eragon had made up would be going into the Home reverse order from when we sat in a circle saying their names. Kye and Leona would be going second.

* * *

><p>The first pair, a Urgal and the female elf, came out crying. They didn't find an egg. Leona gulped. It was their turn to head in.<p> 


End file.
